At a recent conference of domestic help office owners, lawyer Faisal Al-Enezi pointed out that there were several items in law 68/2015 that was against the owners of domestic help offices. Enezi noted that Article 3, item 2 of the law states that owners should have a general secondary school certificate, be in good physical shape and should not have a handicap in order to be issued a license or to renew their license for bringing domestic help from abroad. He said this article is unfair considering there are many offices run by owners without a school certificate.

Moreover, Enezi added that despite the law, no new licenses have been issued for those who satisfy the conditions, and no reasons have been given for this. It seems to indicate that this was done intentionally so one company could monopolize the profession. He predicted that once the law was implemented, many offices would have their licenses revoked and the cost of hiring a maid from abroad would rise to KD2,500.

In the same vein, former director of the domestic help offices union Hashim Majid said law 68/2015 contained unfair items that merely appeased human rights organizations and was partial to domestic helpers, while ignoring the issues faced by domestic help office owners and citizens. Moreover, he added that the secondary school certificate condition of the law was unconstitutional.

Majid was also against the increase in the probation period of domestic helpers from 100 days to six months, as he said this causes office owners to incur losses. Moreover, he was of the opinion that the office should not have to pay anything to the sponsors or for the domestic helpers’ return tickets home, as the guarantee should be meant to cover only workers who are unhealthy, pregnant or face security restrictions, and not those absconding to the embassies of their countries.